


orchard boy

by sodas



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-13
Updated: 2013-09-13
Packaged: 2017-12-26 10:59:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/965154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sodas/pseuds/sodas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Wanna climb a mountain with me?" he asks, with his mouth pressed to Armin's cheek.</p>
            </blockquote>





	orchard boy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [splitpsychosis](https://archiveofourown.org/users/splitpsychosis/gifts).



> for tumblr user thirdimpactmyheart. depictions of bullying.

His tongue doesn't feel like a tongue. It feels like cotton, a wad too big for his mouth, and it tastes like a coin. Actually, does the tongue have the capacity to taste itself? Armin prods around his lips with slippery fingers and finds the bottom to be broken open. That's as much as he'd expected: it's got a hurt that comes with gaping, and he can feel blood filling the grooves of his gums. 

"It's pretty bad," Eren says helpfully. Or, he sounds like he's trying to help, but that's not much of a comfort. Armin glances aslant. His fringe is damp with sweat, and it clings to his eyelashes; Eren is blurred and obscured by Armin's blond hair. He's too embarrassed to push it out of his eyes, the left of which is likely purpling underneath, above a mottled cheek. 

"I figured," he says back, trying to shrink. It doesn't work; he just curls in on his knees a little.

"Mikasa's gonna be mad."

"Yeah."

" _I'm_ mad."

Armin looks up, and then back down. "Yeah."

"At them, I mean. Not at you." That makes Armin feel better, but only marginally. Eren picks at some weed sticking out of a crack in the ground and tries to throw it, but it flutters uselessly and lands at Eren's feet. He rubs his nose with the back of his wrist. "It's shit," he says daringly. He's trying to sound grown up, and Armin knows it. "How they treat you. It's stupid."

"I'm weird," Armin says, looking at the weed next to Eren's grubby toes. Eren shouldn't run around the alleys barefoot. 

Eren shakes his head so hard that Armin's own skull starts pounding just watching him. Or maybe that's from the beating. "You're not," Eren says. 

"I am," Armin says, shrugging into himself. He puts his hand onto one of Eren's, and Eren clasps fingers with him. Armin feels like a baby. "I say things that... They don't like it. Maybe it's because they don't get to see it. I want to see it."

"You will," Eren says reassuringly. "Me, too. 'Cos we're gonna go outside, right?"

Adults are condescending people, but they tell Armin, _You're bright._ They tell him he's gifted. A smart cookie. Armin's never even eaten a cookie before, that's for richer folk, those who can afford sugar. He probably couldn't be a cookie if he tried. 

Sometimes, though, he's foolish. Does being self-aware about that make it any better? Probably not, he decides, feeling like an empty burlap sack. He lets his weight drop against Eren's side. He's _really_ foolish. There are days he imagines his parents are building a little house outside the walls. A cabin. It's going to be made from the wood of trees. It's going to have mortar and a chimney. And, when they're done building it, they'll come back for him and for his grandfather. They'll live out there together and see grasslands and shining sand and whales that could swallow Titans whole. That's what he likes to think. That's when he's especially stupid. "Uh-huh," he says to Eren. "Outside. To the rocky mountains."

"To the boiling fire places?"

"To the salty water."

Eren grins at him, but Armin's mouth hurts too much to smile back. "Yep," he says, swinging his feet, absently kicking away the weed. And he leans in suddenly, which Armin flinches at, to nose into Armin's hair. "Wanna climb a mountain with me?" he asks, with his mouth pressed to Armin's cheek. Armin nods against him. Eren seems satisfied with this, and draws back long enough to lean back in, kissing Armin's lower lip more carefully than he does anything else. Then he's away again. When he beams, Armin can see a red smear on his mouth. "To make it feel better," Eren says with conviction, and they bump their shoulders together like best friends. "You will, you'll feel better," Eren promises him. 

"I already do," Armin says, and Eren nods with the enthusiasm of any nine-year-old. 

"You know," he says, "you bruise like a peach, but you don't taste like one at all."


End file.
